We’re using The NextStage Political Reader to determine how people will vote in the 2012 US Presidential election and so far we’ve learned two distinct things:

The voting population that we’re able to sample is incredibly fickle. We’re sure their political leanings are driven by something but what, exactly, we’re not sure.

The first chart, Say, usually tracks the latest national polls for the same days within the margin of error.Pretty good, we thinks, as we’re not actually asking anybody anything, just observing how visitors behave on a variety of websites, the majority of which are not political at all.

A Quick Read of the Charts

Say – What people would tell you in conversation. These numbers should be closest to national polls.

Think – Which party do people think will do better. This may or may not be who people would vote for or who they want to win, only who they think will do better.

Hearts – This is the number that most closely responds to the outcome of a secret ballot if held today.

End – If people could be magically transported to their real voting venue and knew for a fact that their vote would actually make a difference, how would they vote?

The Fickle Voter

We tracked daily visitor political leanings 19-22 Oct 2012. We’re not sure what happened over the weekend to cause the amazing Saturday Republican Surge nor the gradual climb of the Democrats (we don’t follow the news much unless we’re paid to). What we do know is that the Republican Surge corresponds to a surge in monitored visitor traffic (the % next to the days on the x-axis of the charts is the % of voting population we monitored each day). Saturday’s traffic volume was 3-9x what we monitored on the other days. If the increased traffic is the sole cause of the increased Republicanism (and recognizing we’re not necessarily monitoring the same visitors each day), this could be bad news for the Democrats.

Who Would They Say They’d Vote Right Now?

But What Do They Think?

And What Are Their Hearts Telling Them?

And In the End, Will Hearts or Minds Prevail?

A Final Word

The time for either party to strike is when voter hearts and minds are within a few points of each other. Hearts and minds with close numbers indicate voters’ higher and lower brains, conscious and non-conscious, are closely aligned. People act without thinking and without later remorse for their actions when conscious and non-conscious are aligned.